On May 7, 2012, at 10:38 AM, Julio Huato wrote:
... the growth rate of GDP is a pretty good proxy for the (ceiling of the) profit rate over the long run, as GDP (value added) = s + v. ...
This is not Marx, it's Adam Smith. Marx (especially in Theörien) points out that Smith fails to understand that the value of a commodity consists of c+v+s, not v+s, and by removing c Smith sends us "from pillar to post." And GDP, of course, does not consist of "value added" but of the value of all final products. And since all final products' values consist of c+v+s, GDP likewise is nothing but the sum of those values. Even if instead of GDP you use NDP (excluding capital consumption as well as indirect business taxes) you still are left with the c component, in the form of the cost of unproductive labor--for Marx a basic category and one which he insists must be paid out of the aggregate product. Surplus value is the "produit net"--the income available to the propertied classes for consumption and investment. Since over time the share of total output going to unproductive labor has increased vastly, the growth rate of GDP has no relation at all to changes in the rate of profit.
Shane Mage This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire, kindling in measures and going out in measures." Herakleitos of Ephesos
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